Anime Like Five Came Back
If you loved Five Came Back's Documentary and War & Politics storytelling, these anime deliver a similar experience — selected for art style, narrative depth, and emotional impact. Each includes where to stream it now.
★ Top Picks

WWII in HD
WWII in HD is a 10-part American documentary television miniseries that originally aired from November 15 to November 19, 2009 on the History Channel. The program focuses on the firsthand experiences of twelve American service members during World War II, including an Army nurse, a member of the Tuskegee Airmen, a second generation Japanese American and prisoner of war, and an Austrian Jewish immigrant. The twelve members recorded their time in both theaters and some had later interviews; found footage from the battlefield was paired with the stories of the twelve service members. The episodes premiered on five consecutive days, with two episodes per day. The series is narrated by Gary Sinise and was produced by Lou Reda Productions in Easton, Pennsylvania, United States.

The War
The story of the Second World War through the personal accounts of a handful of men and women from four American towns. The war touched the lives of every family on every street in every town in America and demonstrated that in extraordinary times, there are no ordinary lives.

Band of Brothers
Drawn from interviews with survivors of Easy Company, as well as their journals and letters, Band of Brothers chronicles the experiences of these men from paratrooper training in Georgia through the end of the war. As an elite rifle company parachuting into Normandy early on D-Day morning, participants in the Battle of the Bulge, and witness to the horrors of war, the men of Easy knew extraordinary bravery and extraordinary fear - and became the stuff of legend. Based on Stephen E. Ambrose's acclaimed book of the same name.

Greatest Events of World War II in Colour
Using highly advanced colourisation techniques, critical moments from World War II, from Stalingrad to The Battle of Britain, are shown in a whole new light.

Masters of the Air
During World War II, airmen risk their lives with the 100th Bomb Group, a brotherhood forged by courage, loss, and triumph.

War and Remembrance
War and Remembrance is an American miniseries based on the novel of the same name by Herman Wouk. It is the sequel to highly successful The Winds of War.

World War II in Colour
World War II In Colour is a 13-episode television documentary miniseries recounting the events of World War II narrated by Robert Powell. The show covers the Western Front, Eastern Front, and the Pacific War. It is on syndication in America on the Military Channel. This series is in full color, combining both original and colorized footage.
More Anime Like Five Came Back

The Winds of War
Set against the backdrop of world events that led to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Victor "Pug" Henry is a career naval officer who, along with his family, learns to navigate the waters of his dangerous times in the late 1930s.

Nuremberg
Justice Robert H. Jackson leads Allied prosecutors in trying 21 Germans for Nazi war crimes after World War II.

The World at War
A documentary series that gives a historical account of the events of World War II, from its roots in the 1920s to the aftermath and the lives it profoundly influenced.

The Pacific
Track the intertwined real-life stories of three U.S. Marines – Robert Leckie, John Basilone, and Eugene Sledge – across the vast canvas of the Pacific Theater during World War II. A companion piece to the 2001 miniseries Band of Brothers.

World on Fire
The story of World War II told through the intertwining fates of ordinary people from all sides of this global conflict as they grapple with the effect of the war on their everyday lives.

Combat!
Combat! is an American television program that originally aired on ABC from 1962 until 1967. The show covered the grim lives of a squad of American soldiers fighting the Germans in France during World War II. The program starred Rick Jason as platoon leader Second Lieutenant Gil Hanley and Vic Morrow as Sergeant "Chip" Saunders.

Generation Kill
The first 40 days of the war in Iraq as seen through the eyes of an elite group of U.S. Marines who spearheaded the invasion along with an embedded Rolling Stone reporter. A vivid account of the soldiers and of the forces that guided them in an often-improvised initiative.

A Small Light
Twentysomething Miep Gies didn't hesitate when her boss Otto Frank came to her and asked her to hide his family from the Nazis during World War II. For the next two years, Miep, her husband Jan, and the other helpers watched over the eight souls in hiding in the Secret Annex. And it was Miep who found Anne’s Diary and kept it safe so Otto, the only one of the eight who survived, could later share it with the world as one of the most powerful accounts of the Holocaust.

The Liberator
A diverse, dedicated, rough-and-tumble squad of soldiers spearheads the Allied invasion of Italy during World War II.

Catch-22
Pianosa Island, Italy, World War II. Bombardier John Yossarian tries to fulfill his duty, maintain sanity and return home as soon as possible, but incompetence and bureaucracy constantly stand in his way.

12 O'Clock High
This series chronicles the adventures--in the air and on the ground--of the men of the 918th Bombardment Group of the U.S. Eighth Air Force. First commanded by irascible General Frank Savage--and later by Colonel Joe Gallagher, the son of a Pentagon General--the Group is stationed in England, and flies long-range bombing missions into German-held Europe.

World War II: From the Frontlines
Through vividly enhanced archival footage and voices from all sides of the conflict, this docuseries brings WWII to life like never before.
Why These Anime Are Similar
These recommendations share core qualities with Five Came Back (2017): Documentary and War & Politics themes, comparable animation style, and similar narrative pacing. NoBadPicks uses TMDB collaborative filtering, genre matching, and AI analysis to surface anime most likely to resonate with fans of Five Came Back.
See full details for Five Came Back (2017)
